Monday, November 9, 2015

I started scrapbooking over 15 years ago and have taken photos for most of my life. My dad gave me a camera for my 10th birthday and it remains one of my favourite things to do. My friends and family are more surprised if I don't have a camera in my hand than if I do. (Even though my girls don't like me taking their photo's now, they still go through the old ones to use when posting on their friends Facebook pages for birthdays etc. so I must have done the right thing at one point.)

About the time I started scrapbooking, I took this photo of my eldest daughter at her first ballet concert and printed off a copy for my mother. She kept it in a frame on the bookcase and the other day bought it to me asking if she could have another as this one had deteriorated so badly (due to years of exposure to sunlight). Which leads me to why I scrapbook - not only to be creative and express myself artistically but to preserve memories and moments in time by containing them in acid free albums out of sunlight and dust's harms way.

I then had the task of looking through negatives to find the original photo and reprint it. A daunting task as while I am organised with photos, the negs are a bit of a nightmare. But I did find it without too much drama:

I went & bought a negative/slide scanner and now have a new project, which considering the number of photos I have taken will be a huge task (as well as those of my Dad). This mean my scrapbooking and card making may have to take a back seat for a bit but I still hope to share on a regular basis, some creativity.

Sunday, November 8, 2015

I make no secret of my love for paper dolls. I have said it before and I will say it again "They remind me of my childhood - I have always loved to play with paper and dress them up".

It is something that I think kids/young adults these days don't realise, that there was a time when real dolls were expensive and if you had more than one, you were very lucky. So paper dolls, you could have a few and be happy with that and make cute outfits. They didn't take up a lot of room and were easily transportable and swapable (not a real word - I know.

I love Audrey's classic style and so I made this card for my classic, stylish friend, Maria:

Monday, November 2, 2015

I have tinkered with art journalling in the past and really enjoy it. The whole process, the getting messy, using up stuff and just being creative with no other purpose - very liberating.

But as with most creative things I got stuck in a mojo-less rut and put away my art journal, until.... this weekend I went to a class and WOW did I get inspired. It was so much fun, that I did another page the very next day. Thought I'd share:

This was the one I did in the class, so colours, theme etc were sort of predetermined, but very relevant and below is my very own creation - lovin' it!